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V 



OHN TYLER 

ADDRESS DELIVERED BEFORE THE " 

COLONIAL DAMES OF AMERICA 
IN THE STATE OF VIRGINIA 




AT 



GREENWAY, CHARLES CITY COUNTY, VA. 
ON MONDAY, OCTOBER 27, 1913 

AT THE UNVEILING OF A MEMORIAL TO 

MARK THE BIRTHPLACE OF 

PRESIDENT TYLER 



BY 



HON. GEORGE L. CHRISTIAN 

OF RICHMOND, VA. 



1913 

WHITTET & SHEPPERSON, Printers 

Richmond, Va, 



• * 



Colonial Dames of America 
in the State of Virginia 



JOHN TYLER 



J 



ADDRESS DELIVERED BEFORE THE 



COLONIAL DAMES OF AMERICA 
IN THE STATE OF VIRGINIA 



AT 



GREENWAY, CHARLES CITY COUNTY, VA. 
ON MONDAY, OCTOBER 27, 1913 

AT THE UNVEILING OF A MEMORIAL TO 

MARK THE BIRTHPLACE OF 

PRESIDENT TYLER 



BY 



HON. GEORGE L. CHRISTIAN 

OF RICHMOND, VA. 



1913 

WHITTET & SHEPPERSON, Printers 

Richmond, Va, 






MAS 13 m 






JOHN TYLER 



ADDRESS DELIVERED BEFORE THE 

COLONIAL DAMES OF AMERICA 
IN THE STATE OF VIRGINIA 



Ladies of the Colonial Daiucs of America, in the State of Vir- 
ginia, My Old Friends of Charles City, Ladies and 
Gentlemen : 

Whilst I am duly sensible of the partiality which induced my 
selection as the spokesman of this occasion ; yet I regret that the 
task was not assigned to one more capable of performing it, 
as it should be performed, and that the summons came to me at 
a season when it was simply impossible for me to devote to the 
preparation of this address the time necessary to enable me to 
speak of my illustrious subject even to my own satisfaction. 
On one account only do I rejoice that I was chosen, and that is, 
it gave me an opportunity to study more closely and critically 
the character and career of my illustrious countyman than I 
had done before, and to be able to tell the people of Charles City 
of to-day more about the truly great and good man reared on 
their sacred soil, although within the limits of this address, it 

Page Five 



will be impossible for me to do more than to give in briefest 
outline some of the salient features of the private life and remark^ 
able public career of my old friend, neighbor and countyman. 

When the Duke of Wellington, in his pld age, revisited the 
athletic fields of Eton, the school of his boyhood, he exclaimed: 
"Here is where the battle of Waterloo was won." And so, when 
John Tyler looked upon "Greenway" and Charles City, he doubt- 
less felt that there was the arena on which he had laid the founda- 
tion-stones of his truly brilliant and remarkable career. 

John Tyler was the son of Judge John Tyler and Mary 
Armistead, his wife, of the family of Armisteads of "Buckroe," 
near Hampton, Va. The father was one of the most ardent and 
devoted of the Revolutionary patriots. He was a member and 
Vice-President of the Convention of 1788, and stood with Henry, 
Monroe, Mason and others in opposing the adoption of the Federal 
Constitution, claiming that in some of its features it would be 
"more oppressive than British tyranny" ; and we have lived to 
see that he was right in what he then said. He was a distin- 
guished judge of the General Court of Virginia, Speaker of the 
House of Delegates, Governor of the State, and was at the time 
of his death judge of the District Court of the United States 
of Virginia. A writer of that day says : 

"He was simple in his manners, distinguished for the up- 
nghtness and fidelity with which he discharged his official duties, 
and enjoyed in an uncommon degree the esteem and confidence of 
his fellow-citizens." 

John Tyler, Jr., was born at this place, "Greenway," on March 
29, 1790, and here he began a career which for rapidity in achieve- 
ment, consistency of conduct, and exalted moral character, finds 
few equals, and no superior, in the annals of American history. 
It is, therefore, meet, that this Society, which has done so much 
to rescue from oblivion and to preserve the history and ideals of 
our glorious past, should come to this sacred spot, and place here 
a memorial to commemorate the deeds and virtues of this truly 
great, and good Virginian ; one who climbed to the top- 

Page Six 



most round of the ladder of fame in America, and who won 
every step of that ascent by his genius, his manly virtues and his 
steadfast fidelity and devotion to truth, to principle and to duty. 

Mr. Tyler began his school days at a school then kept just 
across the road, and of which a Scotchman, named McMurdo, 
was the master. At the age of thirteen, he entered the Grammar 
School of William and Mary College (the Alma Mater of so 
many distinguished Virginians), and graduated from that institu- 
tion at seventeen. He delivered, on graduating, what was said to 
be one of the best addresses of the kind ever heard within the 
walls of that College. He then read law, first under his father, and 
then with Edmund Randolph, afterwards Attorney-General of the 
United States, and at the age of nineteen, was admitted to the 
bar, and at once secured a fine practice. Before reaching his 
majority, he was nominated for the Legislature, but declined. 
As soon as he was of age, he was elected to the House of Dele- 
gates of Virginia, and was successively returned for five years 
with practical unanimity. At the first session of the Legislature, 
his sagacity, eloquence and winning manners, gave him a posi- 
tion as a leader, something very rarely attained by one of his 
years. 

Wendell Phillips, speaking of Abraham Lincoln, said : 

"I judge Mr. Lincoln by his words and deeds, and so judging 

him, I am unwilling to trust him with the future of this country. 

Mr. Lincoln is a politician ; politicians are like the bones of a 

horse's foreshoulder — not a straight one in it." 

I am going to prove to you, and that too, not from the able 
and exhaustive work of his son, that John Tyler was, from the 
beginning to the end of his public life, a straight and consistent 
politician, gentleman and patriot, and that some of those who 
denounced him later in life, were after the order of those whom 
Wendell Phillips described Abraham Lincoln as being a type. 

During the session of the Legislature of i8ii-'i2, Air. Tyler 
played a part, which has ever since borne testimony to his con- 
sistency and integrity in two of the most important acts of his 

Page Seven 



political life. The Legislature had instructed Virginia's Sena- 
tors in Congress, Messrs. Giles and Brent, to vote against ex- 
tending the charter of the United States Bank, and these Sena- 
tors had refused to obey these instructions. Mr. Tyler then of- 
fered a resolution censuring these Senators, and claimed that 
the Legislature, representing the constituency of Senators, had 
the right to instruct them, and that it was their duty to obey these 
instructions, or to resign their places. He took two positions then 
from which he never departed: 

first — That the act creating the United States Bank was un- 
constitutional ; and 

Second — That the Legislature had the right to instruct Sena- 
tors in Congress, and that it was the duty of Senators to obey 
these instructions, or to resign their seats. 

The changes which occur in political life are strange and 
sometimes truly accountable. In 1811 Henry Clay voted against 
extending the charter of the Bank of the United States, on the 
ground that the act creating it was unconstitutional. 

In 181 2 Benjamin Watkins Leigh drew the resolution in- 
structing Senators of Virginia to vote against rechartering the 
United States Bank, and Mr. Tyler introduced the resolution to 
censure these Senators for disobeying Mr. Leigh's instructions. 

In 1816 Mr. Clay voted for rechartering the bank, notwith- 
standing his vote against it in 181 1, and in 1836 Mr. Leigh vio- 
lated his own resolution of 1812 in respect to instructions by re- 
fusing to obey the instructions of the Legislature to vote to ex- 
punge a portion of the Journal of the Senate and he also refused 
to resign. 

But Mr. Tyler remained firm and consistent on both of these 
questions during his whole political life. 

And yet, no two men were more bitter in their denunciations 
of Mr. Tyler in 1836 and in 1841 than Mr. Clay and Mr. Leigh, 
for alleged inconsistency on these same two questions. And the 
sad but almost ludicrous absurdity of popular favor is illustrated 

Page Eight 



by the fact that Mr. Clay and Mr. Leigh were held up at that 
time as paragons of consistency, whilst Mr. Tyler was denounced 
as a traitor to the principles of his party. 

Whilst a member of the Legislature, Mr. Tyler was elected 
a member of the Executive Council of the State, and was serv- 
mg m that capacity when in 1816 he was elected to Congress 
He was chosen over Andrew Stevenson, an able and popular 
gentleman, who was, at the time, Speaker of the House of Dele- 
gates, afterwards Speaker of the House of Representatives in 
Congress, and later Minister to the Court of St. James Both 
were members of the same political party, the Democratic- 
Republican Party, and both were popular and powerful debaters 
on the stump, and that, too. at a time when the stump was the 
great political and moral teacher of the people. Mr Tyler was 
just old enough to be eligible when he took his seat in Cono-ress 
in December, 1816. General Wise says: 

"His success at the commencement of his career was doubt- 
less owing, not only to the great influence of his own family, and 
especially of his father, and to his own genius and genial manners, 
but also to his happy early marriage, on the anniversary of his 
birth, the 29th of March. 1813, to Letitia Christian, the third 
daughter of Robert Christian, Esq., of "Cedar Grove," in the 
County of New Kent, Va. This marriage united the house of 
Democracy in the bridegroom, with the house of Federalism in 
the bride. The father of the bridegroom was no less the friend 
and adherent of Thomas Jefferson, than the father of the bride 
was the friend and adherent of George Washington. 

"Robert Christian was one of the main leaders of the Federal 
Party, and was necessarily so from being the honored head of a 
name the most numerous on the Peninsula of the James and the 
York." 

General Wise then pays a beautiful tribute to the character of 
Mrs. Tyler, but since she was my kinswoman, I will not quote 
what he further says of her here. 

Mr. Tyler began his national career at the close of Madi- 

Poge Nine 



son's, and the beginning of Monroe's administration, when the 
questions before the country were both exciting and important. 
It is generally thought, I believe, that Mr. Clay was the founder 
of the system of internal improvements by the government, but 
the truth is, Mr. Calhoun was the originator of that system, and 
Clay did not adopt it at all until years after, when he embraced 
it in his so-called great "American System," and then Calhoun 
not only gave it up, but disowned it, having changed his views 
about that just as Clay had changed his about the bank. But 
Mr. Tyler was at all times, and under all circumstances, a strict 
constructionist and "State Rights" Southern Democrat, both on 
principle and in practice. Having served, with distinction in 
Congress for five years, his health became impaired, and he re- 
signed and resumed his law practice. Ten years of distinguished 
public services, both in the State and National councils, had, 
however, firmly established his reputation as a statesman, as a 
Democrat of the school of Jefferson and as a man, who by his 
consistent conduct, his talents, his integrity and his dignity of 
character, had won for himself both influence and reputation 
throughout the country. 

On leaving Congress, he returned to his native county, and 
there soon regained his health. In 1823 he was again sent to 
the Legislature of Virginia, in which he served with great use- 
fulness for two years, and in 1825, was elected Governor of Vir- 
ginia. This office he filled with signal ability to the satisfaction 
of the people of the State, and hence he was unanimously re- 
elected by the Legislature in 1826. 

On January 13, 1827, Mr. Tyler was elected United States 
Senator, defeating the able, distinguished, but eccentric John 
Randolph, of Roanoke, and that, too, when Mr. Tyler did not 
seek the office, insisting that he preferred the one he then held, 
and that Mr. Randolph should be his own successor in the Senate. 
But Mr. Randolph had bitterly assailed the alleged "bargain and 
corruption" coalition between John Quincy Adams and Mr. Clay, 
and whilst these two men had no special use for Mr. Tyler, since 
he was the only man they could beat Mr. Randolph with, they 

Page Ten 



. , r T , ''' P^'P"^''- '^^"^ ^^^ t'^e fi^^t contest in 

which Mr Tyler s popularity really suffered, since it necessarily 
alienated the friends of Mr. Randolph, whose name was "legion'' 
at that time, throughout Virginia. 

Mr. Tyler entered the Senate of the United States on Decem- 
ber 3 1827. He steadfastly opposed the administration measures 
of Adams and Clay, such as the Bank of the United States, the 
taritt of 1828 and internal improvement by the Government The 
Adams and Clay party was completely crushed by General Jack- 
son s election in 1828, which Mr. Tyler earnestly supported. 
Mr. Tyler had, however, offended Jackson, just as Mr. Calhoun 
had, by censuring him for the unwarranted execution of Arbuth- 
nut and Ambrister during the Florida War, and Jackson never 
torgave any man who had done that. But the ''State Rights" 
Party, with Calhoun and Tyler then at its head, did support many 
or the measures of Jackson's administration. 

"p-iy^'.T.^''^°^ ^^'^''' ''''^' ''^'^^ ''^' then called the tariff 
Bill of Abominations" of 1828, was renewed and continued 
m 1832, and this arrayed section against section in an intermi- 
nable and bitter strife between the respective advocates of free 
trade and protection. The North was at the first opposed to pro- 
tection, but soon, having largely increased its manufacturing in- 
terests, that section became the most clamorous advocate of that 
system. The South being the producers of the main staples for 
export, Its theory was that the consumers of imports would pay 
the bounties of protection. 

In the midst of this contest, Mr. Clay brought forward h*s 
resolution distinguishing between articles manufactured within 
and those manufactured without the United States This was' 
in the opinion of Mr. Tyler, very injurious to the interests of 
the South, and as he was always a devoted Southerner he met 
the issue with signal ability. He then predicted that the estab- 
lishment of such a system was "sowing the dragon's teeth," and 
that it would engender bitterness between the North and the 
South ; and this prophecy has been literallv fulfilled ; for in this 
tariff act was laid the real foundation of tl'ie late so-called "Civil 

Paore Eleven 



War." It was the cause of the attempt at "Nullification" on the 
■part of South Carolina, which was only allayed by a change of 
policy brought about by Mr. Clay. As General Wise puts it: 
"Mr. Tyler alone had the honor of voting against the 'Force 
Bill,' while Mr. Clay, who raised the demon, got the credit of 
exorcising him." 

One of the first and most conspicuous positions taken by Mr. 
Tyler on entering public life was, as we have seen, against tiic 
constitutionality of the act creating the Bank of the United States, 
and so, when the questions concerning the bank came before 
Congress in i83i-'2, he put forth his every efifort to weaken the 
influence and capacity for evil, of that baleful institution, and 
when General Jackson vetoed the act extending the charter of the 
bank, Mr. Tyler heartily supported that veto. He had, however, 
voted against the "Force Bill," Jackson's pet measure to coerce 
South Carolina and to hang Calhoun, and this fact, together with 
his criticisms of Jackson's conduct about Arbuthnut and Am- 
brister, before referred to, had forever alienated him from 
Jackson. 

In 1833 Jackson determined to remove the deposits from the 
Bank of the United States to certain State Banks, and as Mr. 
Duane, his Secretary of the Treasury, refused to do this, Jack- 
son removed him, and appointed Mr. Taney in his stead, who did 
remove them. For this act of the President, in "assuming to 
himself power and authority, not conferred by the Constitution 
and laws, but in derogation of both," Jackson was censured by a 
decisive vote of the Senate, and Mr. Tyler voted for the resolu- 
tion of censure. Mr. Benton gave notice, at the time, that he 
would have that resolution expunged from the Journal, and he 
did. Subsequently friends of Jackson got through the Virginia 
Legislature a resolution instructing her Senators, Mr. Tyler and 
Benjamin Watkins Leigh, to vote for expunging the resolution 
of censure; but Mr. Tyler refused to obey these instructions, 
and, rather than do so, resigned his seat. Mr. Leigh refused to 
obey the instructions, and also refused to resign although as we 
have seen, he had concurred with Mr. Tyler in 181 2, on the ques- 

Pa^e Tivelve 



tion, that it was the duty of a Senator to obey the instructions of 
the Legislature, or to resign. Mr. Leigh was a great and good 
man, worthy to represent Mrginia anywhere, and at any time, 
but he certainly was not consistent on this question, whilst Mr. 
Tyler was. Mr. Tyler resigned his seat in the Senate on Feb- 
ruary 20, 1836, when he had three years longer to serve, and re- 
tired to private life. 

He was not, however, permitted to remain in retirement long. 
He was nominated for the Vice-Presidency that same year on 
the ticket headed by Hugh Lawson White, of Tennessee; but the 
powerful influence of General Jackson, at that time, easily elected 
Mr. \'an Buren although the White and Tyler ticket carried 
Jackson's own State (Tennessee) by a large majority. The 
truth is, the opposition to the succession of Jackson was not or- 
ganized in time for the canvass of 1836. But soon after \'an 
Buren's election the most conglomerate party that ever was gotten 
together in this or any other country, was formed with the single 
aim and object of breaking down that backed by Jackson, and 
nominally headed by Van Buren. "The question was," says Gen- 
eral Wise, "whether they — anti-Bank, anti-protective tariff, anti- 
internal improvement by the Federal Government, pro-annexation 
of Texas, pro-slavery, anti-Federal and anti-latitudinarian, pro- 
strict construction of the Constitution, and pro-State Rights 
Democrats of the Madison school — could unite with the old Fed- 
eralists, and all their extreme opposites in political faith, in order 
to crush the Van Buren party of spoils and corruption." 

This heterogeneous mass, having on its rolls many of the 
very highest and best citizens of the land, comprised the "Whig" 
party, which nominated and elected Wm. Henry Harrison and 
John Tyler (both born in this little county), President and Vice- 
President, respectively, in 1840. It was impossible, in the nature 
of things, for a party composed of so many discordant and op- 
posing elements, to have any well-defined principles or deter- 
minate policy, and it was perfectly understood in the Harrisburg 
Convention, which nominated Harrison and Tyler, that Mr. Tyler 
was put on the ticket, as well on account of his great popularity 

Page Tliirtrcit 



throughout the country, as for his well-known anti-Bank, anti- 
tariff, strict construction, "State Rights" and anti-internal im- 
provement views and principles. As General Wise truly says : 

"He did not commit himself to a Federal party or federal 
opinions, by accepting the nomination, but the Whig Party com- 
mitted itself to Democratic principles and selected a Democrat 
to guard them." 

Mr. Clay was greatly disappointed, and, indeed, exasperated 
because he did not receive the nomination at Harrisburg. Mr. 
Webster was selected as the head of General Harrison's 
Cabinet, and even before that Cabinet was formed, the breach 
between him and Clay was firmly established and this breach 
practically divided the "Whig" party between the followers of 
these leaders on personal grounds. Mr. Clay, as usual, was de- 
termined to "rule or ruin," and he had set to work to do this, 
or break up the party before the death of General Harrison. His 
methods to accomplish this, and how far he succeeded, would 
protract this address beyond its legitimate length, and, there- 
fore, only one or two of these can be referred to. As is well 
known, General Harrison died just one month from the date of 
his inauguration, and Mr. Tyler became President, the first time 
the Vice-President had ever succeeded to that office in the history 
of the country. Instead of forming his own Cabinet, he made the 
m.istake of trying to carry on his administration with that formed 
by General Harrison (the greatest mistake, in my judgment, made 
by him during his administration). That Cabinet was already 
divided between Clay and Webster, and at the very time when 
Mr. Tyler most needed the advice and counsel of those designated 
by the Constitution to render this service, he found himself al- 
most completelystripped of this material and much-needed aid. 
General Harrison had, unfortunately too, before his death, called 
an extra session of Congress to meet on May 31, 1841, and this 
afforded Mr. Clay, still writhing under the effects of his recent 
defeat, the very opportunity he craved, to wreak his vengeance on 
the party, especially on Mr. Webster, the premier of the Cabinet, 
and on Mr. Tyler, now at its head. Mr. Clay was a great intel- 

Page Fourteen 



lect, a great orator, and perhaps the greatest party leader the coun- 
try has yet produced. But, in my opinion, he was neither a good 
man, nor a wise one. He was too ambitious and too selfish to be 
good, and too prejudiced and too impetuous and reckless to be 
wise. But he had, what were then known as the "old line Whigs," 
by the nose, and he knew it and lead them. 

"Where'er his mandates bade them steer." 
He, therefore, determined to drive Mr. Tyler's Cabinet from 
him, and he did this, with the single exception of Mr. Webster 
with the hope that Tyler would not be able to form another 
Cabinet before Congress adjourned, which adjournment was 
only three days off. But, greatly to the astonishment of Mr. 
Clay, Mr. Tyler not only filled the vacancies, but, in most 
cases, with better and abler men, than those who had resigned 
and deserted him in his seeming extremity. Mr. Clay then 
brought forward his bank, tariff, and internal improvement 
measures, in rapid succession, all of which he knew Mr. Tyler 
had spent his political life in opposing. And, of course, Mr. 
Tyler vetoed these almost as fast as they were presented to 
him. 

Since, however, these measures were mainly the offspring of 
Mr. Clay, and he the then recognized leader of the "Whig" party, 
which party had by that name elected Mr. Tyler, he was de- 
nounced as a traitor to his party, and for a time was very un- 
popular with the unthinking, rank and file of that party. Perhaps 
no public man was ever subjected to severer tests of his loyalty 
to principle and to duty, than was Mr. Tyler by the attacks made 
on him by Mr. Clay and his followers, and it is due to his memory 
to say that no man ever passed through such an ordeal more 
triumphantly, and without even the smell of the fire of corrup- 
tion lingering about his garments. His great antagonist did not 
fare so well, and I believe the consensus of opinion is to-day, that 
few great men ever had such opportunities as Mr. Clay had for 
doing good, and accomplished so little for the permanent benefit 
of his country, and especially for the good of the South, of which 
he was one of the most gifted and distinguished representatives. 

Page Fifteen 



Mr. Abell, in his work, written and published during Mr. 
Tyler's administration, speaking of Mr. Tyler's course about the 
bank says : 

"Amid all the changes of parties and deviations of politicians, 
his principles, Jiis sentiments and his conduct have remained the 
same, unvaried and unchanged, and he is perhaps, almost the only 
man whose name has mingled to any great extent with the politics 
of the country for the last thirty years, whose opinions on this 
much mooted subject of a bank have not undergone a partial or a 
radical change." 

And he says further: 

"That there could have been no such ignorance of Mr. Tyler's 
views on this point or the part of the members of the Harrisburg 
Convention, as is alleged, is too palpable to require proof or argu- 
ment; and it is scarcely less certain that it was because of his 
well known hostility to a bank of the United States, and of his 
devotion to the States Rights doctrines of the Jefferson School, 
that he was placed in nomination, in order to secure the support 
to the Harrison ticket of a large body of the people who were 
alike hostile to Mr. Clay and a bank, and to Mr. Van Buren, and 
the leading measures of his administration." * * * 

And Mr. Abell, speaking of the contest between Mr. Tyler and 
Congress, when they tried to "bully" him and "drive him to the 
wall," adds : 

"Single handed and unsustained but by an honest heart and 
the exalted emotions of conscious rectitude ; without a press, as 
far as he knew, which would defend him, and with the certainty 
of converting former friends into deadly foes, he dared all in his 
unwavering fidelity to principle, and to his convictions of what 
was due to the welfare of the people. * * * He pursued 
with inflexible determination, the undeviating course which con- 
sistency demanded, and which his judgment and his conscience 
prompted, neither deterred by violence, nor discouraged by his 
temporary isolation." 

Page Sixteen 



All the "old line" "Henry Clay" Whigs in Charles City were, 
not unnaturally, very bitter in their denunciations of Mr. Tyler, 
for a time. But they lived to see the day, when they saw their 
mistake, and that Mr. Tyler was their consistent and true friend, 
and so at the time of his death, Mr. Tyler was, I believe, the most 
popular, as he was, the most venerated and beloved citizen that 
ever lived in this county. This is attested by the fact, that nearly 
every voter in the county supported him for the Convention of 
1861, and also for the Confederate Congress in 1862, which latter 
office he held at the time of his death. 

The muse of history may be startled from her propriety for 
a time, but she will regain her equipoise, and when she does so, 
she will "right the wrongs" inflicted by the wicked, the ambitious, 
the unthinking or the ignorant. 

Mr. Clay's exhibitions of temper, coupled with the violent 
and apparently absurd efforts brought forward by him to "drive 
Tyler," as he was wont to exclaim, caused the "Whigs" to suffer 
disastrous defeat almost everywhere in the fall elections of 1842, 
and in the next presidential election, when Mr. Clay was the can- 
didate of the Whigs, he was defeated. Thus did the people of the 
country endorse the policies of Mr. Tyler's administration, as 
opposed to those advocated by Mr. Clay, "with a Senate at his 
heels." 

Within the limits of this address, it would be impossible even 
to refer to all of the many important measures accomplished by 
Mr. Tyler's administration, and I shall not attempt to do so. 

The settlement of the difficulties with England by the Ash- 
burton Treaty, the ending of the war in Florida, and the admis- 
sion of that State into the Union ; the suppression of Dorr's re- 
bellion in Rhode Island, the annexation of Texas, and laying the 
foundation for the acquisition of New Mexico and California, are 
only a fev^^ of the many important measures accomplished dur- 
ing that administration. To again use the language of General 
Wise, an actor in those times : 



Page Si'zriitccn 



"Victory after victory, success after success, he won, and 
boon after boon with countless blessings, he bestowed on his 
country, with only a corporal's guard at his command, against 
the hosts of numbers and hells of hate." 

And he then compares Tyler's administration with that of Jef- 
ferson, with great credit in favor of that of the former. Cer- 
tainly there was never a cleaner, more fruitful, or more economi- 
cal administration in the history of the Republic. I only wish 
we could have more of the same kind. 

In a report of the recent speech made in New York by ex- 
Senator Aldrich, of Rhode Island, he said that the Glass-Owen 
Currency Bill, in its essential features of a Government Reserve 
Bank and the power to issue Government notes, followed the plan 
of President Tyler, submitted to Congress in 1841. It is worthy 
of remark that this plan of Mr. Tyler, originated and matured by 
him, met with the endorsement and approval of his whole Cabinet, 
then composed of Mr. Webster, John C. Spencer, Abel P. Upshur 
and other "intellectual giants" ; and Mr. Webster said of it that 
if adopted, "it would prove the most beneficial measure ever en- 
acted for the country, the Constitution alone excepted." Could 
there have been a higher compliment paid to any man ? Does it 
not show, in the opinion of Mr. Webster, that Mr. Tyler was 
the peer of any of the statesmen of his time? 

In the midst of Mr. Tyler's conflicts with Congress, the heavi- 
est grief that can befall a man, came upon him in the death of 
the devoted wife of his youth, she who had been the "angel of 
his career" for twenty-nine years ; she who had borne him a large 
family of children, and "had graced and crowned his home life 
with every blandishment and bliss." She died on September 10, 
1842, beloved and mourned by all who knew her, as is fully and 
faithfully portrayed by Mrs. Halloway in her work, entitled the 
"Ladies of the White House." 

On June 26, 1844, Mr. Tyler married the beautiful and accom- 
plished Miss Julia Gardner, of New York, who presided over the 
White House with great tact and grace during the rest of his 

Page Eighteen 



term, and then retired, with him, to his country home, "Sherwood 
Forest," in Charles City, where they spent seventeen as happy and 
fruitful years as were ever vouchsafed to a kind and indulgent 
husband and devoted wife. They there reared a large family of 
children, the older of whom were the companions and friends of 
my childhood, and some of these I love to number yet as my life- 
long and cherished friends. 

As a boy I remember jMr. Tyler well. He was my father's 
neighbor and friend, and no one ever had a better neighbor or 
truer friend than he was. He was a charming and cultivated 
conversationalist, and I have seen him, time and again, on the 
"court green" with his coterie around him, the center of attrac- 
tion, and the charm of all who came within the sound of his voice. 

Mr. Tyler was a man, as we have said, of real genius, and of 
excellent literary attainments, and, whilst always attractive and 
entertaining, as a speaker, at times, when aroused, he was a con- 
summate orator. Some of his speeches in Congress, and some 
of the public addresses he was called on to deliver, from time to 
time, attest this in the highest degree, and I wish I had the time 
to refer to, or to quote from, some of these here, but I cannot. 
His "State papers," both as Governor and as President, are among 
the best that were ever issued from those offices and the con- 
temptuous and contemptible "flings" of such men as Carl Schurz 
and Theodore Roosevelt only show that they are not worthy to 
"loose the latchet of the shoes" of such patriots and statesmen 
and Christian gentlemen as John Tyler was. 

From 1845, when he left the presidential chair, till 1861, ^Ir. 
Tyler led the life of a retired country gentleman at "Sherwood 
Forest." It was during these years, that, as a boy, I knew him 
well, and learned to love and to venerate him. As before indi- 
cated, the "Whigs" of Charles City, for a time, misled by their 
then political idol, Mr. Clay, were very hostile to Mr. Tyler, but 
they were not long in finding out who was their real friend, and 
who had been all along, the true and consistent patriot and state- 
man. And so, "when their rights were threatened," and the coun- 

Page Nineteen 



try was convulsed in 1861, they turned, almost to a man, to Mr. 
Tyler, to lead them through the wilderness of trial and difficulty 
then surrounding them. He was then in his seventy-first year, 
but he did not hesitate to "come to the front," and as Peace Com- 
missioner to President Buchanan, President of the "Peace Con- 
ference," and a member of the Virginia Convention of 1861, to 
which he was elected, as we have indicated, with great unanimity, 
he did all that could honorably have been done, to save the Union, 
and to "avert the calamity of war." But when he found that our 
then enemies would "listen to no compromise," he said, to use 
the language of a writer of the time, "He hoped that Virginia 
would not listen to the Syren voice of the submissionists. Our 
only hope is stern resistance ; he was old, but was ready to fight, 
and if necessary to lead the van." He, therefore, voted, as a last 
resort, for the secession of Virginia from the Union. When Vir- 
ginia joined the Southern Confederacy, Mr. Tyler was elected, 
first as a member of the Provisional Congress, and then of the 
permanent Congress, and it can be safely said, that no man in 
the South was more trusted and respected, and none did more to 
promote what, he believed, to be the best and highest interests of 
his people and his country than he did. He literally died "with his 
harness on," whilst attending the sessions of the Confederate Con- 
gress in Richmond, on January 17, 1862. The eulogies delivered, 
both by members of the Virginia Legislature and of the Confed- 
erate Congress at the time of his death, attest, in no uncertain way, 
not only the veneration and esteem in which he was held by his 
countrymen, but the value of the services rendered to his country, 
and the deep sense of loss felt by his death. He was buried, with 
all the honors the city, the State and Confederacy could command 
at the time, in beautiful Hollywood, where the rolling, rushing 
waters of the James have, from that day to this, sung a requiem 
to the memory of as noble, true and devoted son of Virginia, as 
ever sprang from her splendid and fruitful loins. As we said on 
a former occasion, we repeat here : 

Lawyer, legislator, orator, statesman and Christian gentleman : 
Happy that people who had such a counsellor and such a leader ; 
one who was literally 'faithful unto death.' 

Page Tzventy 



The great bard has said : 

'"The whirligig of time brings in his avenges," 

And so you have appropriately selected as the memorial of this 
occasion, one of the markers of the flight and revolutions of 
time. The most grateful part of my task to-day, is to look 
through the long vista of years, and to bring to the view of 
this generation, one of the great figures that played a part in 
the days of their grandfathers and grandmothers, but, sadly 
to relate, one w^ho has nearly faded out of sight in the rush of 
new events, and the rise of new stars in the intellectual and 
political firmament. 

But whilst extraordinary genius and virtues and services, 
may be forgotten for a time, they are never permanently lost. 
There will be always left some one to recall them, whether the 
interval be short or long. And so I have, in this imperfect way, 
tried to hold up to the view of this company the record of the 
genius, the virtues and the services of John Tyler, one of the truly 
great and good men of his time, and one who loved his Mother 
Virginia, with an ardor and devotion never surpassed in the life 
of any son of any commonwealth, whose record adorns the pages 
of history. 

"Pygmies are pygmies still, though perched on Alps; 
And pyramids are pyramids in vales. 
Each man makes his own stature, builds himself: 
Virtue alone outbuilds the Pyramids; 
Her monuments shall last when Egypt's fall." 



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